Rangers assign Kreider to AHL

NEW YORK, February 15, 2013 – New York Rangers President and General Manager Glen Sather announced today that the club has assigned forward Chris Kreider to the Connecticut Whale of the American Hockey League (AHL).

Kreider, 21, has registered one goal and one assist for two points, along with four penalty minutes and a plus-two rating in seven games this season. He tallied a point in consecutive games, including his first career regular season point with a goal on February 5 at New Jersey and his first career regular season assist on February 7 against the New York Islanders, after missing the previous five games, including four games due to injury. Kreider made his NHL regular season debut in the season opener on January 19 at Boston.

The 6-3, 230-pounder established an NHL record for most postseason goals (five) and points (seven) by a player before skating in a regular season game during the 2012 playoffs. Kreider tied for first among NHL rookies in goals and power play goals (two), second in game-winning goals (two) and power play points (two), and ranked fourth in points during the playoffs. He also tied for third on the team in playoff goals, first in power play goals and second in game-winning goals. Kreider made his NHL debut on April 16, 2012, at Ottawa in Game 3 of the Eastern Conference Quarterfinals, becoming the first player to win an NCAA title and make his NHL debut in that year’s playoffs since 1990.

The Boxford, Massachusetts native was originally selected by the Rangers as a first round choice, 19th overall, in the 2009 NHL Entry Draft.

777 Comments

Lloyd, like I said, it’s not like he shouldn’t be in the lineup, but he hasn’t exactly earned anything, either. So while we’re all up in arms about what a travesty this is, let’s not forget this: Kreider, both in the NHL and AHL this year, has not been good.

Haha Cory. I was watching one of the games with my fiancee a few nights ago and she wanted to know why in an empty net situation the goaltender didn’t just skate back onto the ice whenever the other team got the puck. I tried to explain it would be a too many men penalty, but then I started thinking it would be funny if teams actually tried to do that by making a fast change.

Lloyd, as I said, I think Kreider should absolutely be in the lineup compared to some of the dead weight, especially Asham. But I’m not devastated by this because it’s not like Kreider’s been any good either.

guys – I know this is the U.S. of A. and that it’s the point of the blog in the first place, but isn;t it a complete waste of time to try to get in Tortorella’s head, to suggest roster moves, etc.? Can;t we just leave that to our professional coaching staff and get back to busting each other cagliones?

I won’t disagree with a lack of stats from Kreider but the sample size is so minimal. And who is the better option now? It would be one thing if there was depth on this team? But let’s say Miller is demoted soon – and I think there’s a strong likelihood of that. Who comes back? Ferreiro? Newbury? Mashinter? This team is already strapped for scoring and unless you’ve got some chance of that from your top offensive forwards. To just bring up more career minor leaguers, I dunno, I don’t see the improvement.

For what it’s worth, I was opposed to calling up Miller in the first place, but I think the guy has at least earned the right to have some time to show what he can do. Kreider’s in the same boat. To just demote them for AHL grinders, eh, seems pointless.

With no “real” spare forwards, my first thought is that move gives pause to the thought the Rangers might be setting up something for a trade. However, I remembered that the Whale play three games in three days this weekend as opposed to the Rangers one game. It will be interesting to see if Kreider is recalled after the Whale’s Sunday game.

I’m going to go way out on a limb here and suggest that maybe some thought/discussion by the organization/coaching staff went into this decision and that it was based on more than what the fans think they see, perhaps what happens or doesn’t in practice, or in video sessions … and, here’s a really odd unusual take: Maybe they all think this might be best for the kid as a player to, you know, do what most young players do and spend some time in the minors before they become full-time NHLers. Seemed to work for pretty much everybody else on the team. But, hey, that’s just me.

Lloyd, all I’m saying is that the coaching staff, as presently constructed, has really done a good job of developing our young players. Granted, they haven’t been presented with elite level forward talent yet, but seeing the job they’ve done with our elite level defensive talent and midlevel forward talent, I’m going to give them the benefit of the doubt on this one. I think they’ve earned it.

I will take a stab at it. He played hurt the first three games and shouldnt have played at all. He played really well in NJ and fairly well the rest of the games. Did he do anything to warrent a benching or worse, a demotion? Hell no! I am a bottom line tyoe of guy and from what I have seen since his return from injury is that they are a better team with him in the lineup than without him. In fact they are a better team with him in than with Boyle. Even though Boyle played ok yesterday.

Here’s another deep, deep thought: Maybe they have that team up there in Hartford to help with a kid’s development as a professional, whereas maybe we thought it was because Hartford was such a hockey hotbed that the NYR just have a team there to rake in zillions of dollars in revenue. People love to see Brandon Segal play.

You really don’t have to get ‘into’ his head – Torts is pretty straightforward with his comments on players and his confidence is correlated to game TOI.

If you feel this team is still a year or two away from Cup dreams, then this shortened season is the worse thing to happen as the urgency to ‘win now’ may be overtaking the importance of developing young players who will contribute to long term team success.

No longer THE KREIDER, now just Kreider and that sucks…kid should be playing top 6 minutes NOW

ok so I understand that your role is to point out that the Rangers as an organization make decisions about their players – that comes as a shock to me, admittedly, but I’ll roll with it.

find me the better options in the Rangers organization to play top 6 minutes right now other than Kreider and Richards. find me the source of scoring on a 2.2 goal per game team; maybe check the Rangers media guide or just wait for the Rangers to announce who they’ve called up and post it here.

Carp, your point about Hartford as training for the NHL is well taken. I just think Kreider played some significant NHL playoff minutes last year, and certainly held his own (understatement). This year, given the extremely small sample size and coming off his injury, not so much. Still, aren’t last year’s playoff minutes more valuable than regular season NHL playoff minutes, and certainly both are more valuable to his development at this point than AHL minutes? Will he develop better and faster by playing against AHL hockey players than against NHL regulars at this point? I just don’t see it. And though he hasn’t exactly earned top 6 minutes yet this year, there are about 4 guys on our current roster that he can play circles around, in my opinion. not naming names.

Who are the young offensive players who developed in Hartford?
Hags – 17 games in hartford
Step – 0 games in Hartford
Kreider – 33 games in Hartford this season – 5 goals; last season POs 18 games – 5 goals
anyone else I am missing from this regime?

Realize the cupboard was not stocked full, but lets not think there is some magic happening there.

I don’t have any particular issue with Kreider being sent down, but everyone on this blog seems to overestimate their own knowledge and ability while also overestimating NYR’s. This is a franchise that has won only four Stanley Cups in nearly ninety years of being.

wow just saw the news. i am not surprised by this. i think the versatility of miller playing center and wing keeps him up and the rangers are never concerned about the entry level crap. if they feel a kid could play they will play him and not worry about the future years in terms of a new deal.

kreider board play needs work. listen for kreider to be the player we want him to be he needs to be on our top line or top 6 and right now hes not. playing 7 mins a night and sitting in 3rd per of tight games will not help him.

You think, Latona? If the could only have enough brains to run every decision they make by every knowledgeable hockey fan, they would’ve won another 10 SCs

How about Kreider being very tentative and indecisive with his play lately? Especially when the game is close? His goal was against NJ when the game was pretty much out of reach. Kid needs to put more mileage, needs to stop over thinking. His game is speed and deadly shot, he can’t react slow. He will be back very soon. Unless, of course, Torts decided last April that he is keeping him there until either of them retires.

my issue with John Tortorella is basically this. I think he’s capable of being an excellent coach, but I think it’s dishonest for anyone to claim he doesn’t let a personal agenda cloud his judgement. I feel that often times he’s too focused on sucking the offense of the games of he’s players to make them what he feels are more complete players, and I don’t know that the players are better off for it. Del Zotto would be an example of a guy I feel Tortorella has drummed the offense out of. DZ looked like an offensively savvy guy initially and now is starting to look like a liability on both ends. It’s possible he’s just not very good or that he’s scared to death and can no longer play his game. I don’t think he’s really improved even if he had a nice point total last season.

The constant benchings for making a turnover…only stands to reason you’re going to destroy creativity with that. It’s one thing to make a bad decision, that should be addressed, but he punishes aggressiveness – which is also the reason this team goes into a shell on the rare occasions they actually have a comfortable lead, no one wants to be caught dead in that offensive zone with a multi-goal lead. When you do that thing to anybody it makes them nervous, and when you do it to young players it saps their confidence. So yeah, I’m not sold that Tortorella knows how to develop offensive talent. As for playing defense, yeah, no argument there. But quite frankly, it’s not as challenging to develop the defensive end, especially if you’ve got forwards or defensemen who aren’t offensively gifted in the first place and don’t feel they’re conceding anything by being defense-first. You can teach people the right way to play defensively. Offensive talent isn’t really taught; only things you can do is nurture it or stifle it.

I don’t see how he was so horrible being that he was out a few games due to injury and when he is dressed to skate he is put on for maybe 9 minutes a game, tops… Not to mention the line he plays on really wasn’t much potential for anything until they called up Miller

I do think, ilb. And in addition, I said I have no issue with Kreider being sent down. While the organization has ceased to be an embarrassment since the lockout, they still haven’t won a trophy other than the Victoria Cup, so I think it’s quite foolish to have blind faith in their decision making i.e. James G.

I get that Kreider hasn’t done much offensively yet, but he at least has the potential to score and is fast. …and the Rangers desperately need that, even if it is to just put Kreider, Nash and Miller on the PP. Pyatt, Ka-Powe, Boyle, Ashem (and you can include Richards as well for the moment)may as well be playing with broom handles when they get a scoring chance. I love the Torts and trust him (sort of) to do the right thing with these kids, but sometimes his decisions leave me scratching my head. I would have kept Kreider up here and rotated who sits in the sky box based on who the opponent is that night and how they are playing in practice. I would much rather see the thoroughbred skating around, and gaining experience, than some of the clydesdales who are plodding along out there.

The problem is that Kreider was not playing assertively enough to merit more playing time. He has the size, speed, and skill to become a player like Nash. He has been tentative, and I’ve seen him pull up on hits quite a few times. He needs to be a bit more definitive in all areas.

The kid is less than a year out of college. Not really sure why some on here act like he’ll never see the ice again.

was talking primarily about young players who broke into the league on Tortorella’s watch

McDonagh he definitely gets credit for. Stepan came out of the gate strong; not convinced he’s actually improved, to be honest. I’ve seen indications that he’s a far softer player than it originally appeared and may be playing out of his depth. I like Stepan as a player but I have doubts he’s a 2nd-line center. Hagelin has played well recently no doubt – just feel like we need to wait a while longer with him. He’s looked great the last few games and I hope it continues.

And then there’s Michael Del Zotto who I think is actually worse now than he was a few years ago. I know he had 41-points a year ago but the more I watch him, the less comfortable he appears to me in any open ice situation. That he’s prone to getting caught leaning wouldn’t be as big of a deal if I thought his offensive game was really good, but let’s fact it, he’s abysmal on the power play and hasn’t developed particularly good sense for when to join the rush. With Tortorella it’s always going to be defense first, and I get that, but I think Del Zotto’s game has been hindered a bit because of that.

The other forwards you mentioned are middling offensive, defense-first guys. Callahan was already good before Tortorella got here. If you want to say Tortorella’s intensity has rubbed off on Callahan and made him better, I can buy that, but I’m not going to say Tortorella made Ryan Callahan anymore than he made Staal or Girardi since those guys were already good when he got here. And really, the crux of my argument has to do with the offensive end. I think John Tortorella can improve defensive play all day long. The scoring side of things, eh, not convinced.

I don’t really think comparing the malfunction of a life-threatening vestigial organ to a hockey club temporarily demoting a young player is sensible or appropriate, ilb. But, to answer your question, the surgeon. There is no certainty, however, that the operation will succeed. And that was my point. Yes, the surgeon would succeed many more times than the programmer. Yet I feel many of us, myself included, tend to think more of both ourselves and of the Rangers than perhaps we should. Olga and Miami excluded, obviously.

Staal, that is a better way to phrase it, yes. I think the premise is the same.

Really, I don’t have a problem with the move, considering that Torts is playing him only a few minutes a night. Either play him or let him go down and play. If Torts has no intention of playing him, then sending him down is the best thing.

The problem is, even with CK not scoring his line is more of a threat that the other team has to pay attention to than using Boyle or Halperin or whoever. The team needs ONE more solid forward who can put the puck in the net. Maybe that’s coming in a trade, maybe not.

imagine if surgery was a spectator sport that thrived on the existence of people willing to shell out a significant percentage of their income to watch men play a game. and then imagine some hypocrite decided that the people who pay money to sustain the existence of said game were told they shouldn’t have an opinion and instead leave it to the experts.

There biggest problem with the move is Kreider rarely played top 6 mins after his return from injury in the last 4 games. Torts put him on Line 3 with Boyle and Miller (another rookie) or with other checkers/plodders.

Given make up of team, could have moved him up with Step and Nash and moved Hags with Gabby and B Rich and played the best 6 offensive forwards – remember safe is death…

Kreider shooting 33% – put him with Nash and the kid will light the lamp…

He will be back soon enough, but now the team becomes less potent offensively.

Lloyd, we’ll have to agree to disagree on MDZ because I think he has grown to become a much more complete hockey player from his first year when he was basically the same thing as Cam Fowler was in his rookie year. Sure, it’s easy to score a ton of points and look good on offense when you ignore playing defense. Likewise for Stepan, who I think is starting to figure out how to play offense without losing his defensive responsibilities. If he could only win a faceoff…

I didn’t mention Staal because I don’t think his game has improved all that much over the past couple of years, but c’mon, you can’t tell me that Girardi hasn’t improved leaps and bounds under Torts. People were whispering about him as an outside Norris candidate last year. Under Renney he was just a solid, but unspectacular 2nd pairing guy.

As for Callahan, Torts has trusted him to play offense. He was an injury away from 30 goals last season.

But let’s focus on forwards only, since the real debate is about Kreider. How many elite-level forward prospects have the Rangers had in their system in the past decade? One: Chris Kreider. JT Miller wasn’t even considered an elite offensive talent. So there is no basis for comparison as to what Torts and his staff can do with such a blue chipper.

But what I am saying is, given their track record on defense and with midlevel forward prospects, I’m willing to give them the benefit of the doubt on their handling of Kreider. Do I think it’s the right move? No. I think he should be playing 13-15 controlled minutes a night. But am I ready to storm the castle gates or say I don’t think Torts knows what he’s doing? Not at all. Because he’s shown me that he can do this.

If this were Renney, for example, I’d be at the next game starting a “Fire Renney” chant every 5 minutes. There’s a guy who is just awful at developing young players.

There are a lot of woe is me cynical people around here, and it is mostly justified. I think many of us have been fans of the team long enough to have seen the eras of bad free agent signings, missing the playoffs, the smurfs, etc.

The thing is, I believe in this current organization, and the direction they’re headed in. I am not a Rangers apologist, but there is a lot of reason to be hopeful. The core of the team is still very young, and I do believe there is a good chance to win the Cup within five years.

So, while I understand why some will bring up the 4 Cups in almost 90 years, I think all that history should also show you that they are about as close as they have been in a long time.

Again, my focus is on the offensive side of the puck. I think Tortorella is more than capable of improving players defensively. I think Girardi is probably an overall better player than he was a few years ago; my comment was that he wasn’t a guy who broke into the league under Tortorella and had amassed skills prior to Tortorella taking over the team. But do I think he’s better now? Sure. But John Tortorella improving defensemen doesn’t really surprise me.

That being said, from what I see, Del Zotto is not as good as he was a few years ago. I see a very limited offensive presence and a somewhat average defensive player. Maybe that’s good enough, I don’t know. I thought more was expected from him than that. Del Zotto has no business being on the power play and I would hope the Tortorella regime could help in that capacity – it’s not really fair to single out DZ here either since this power play has been a joke for a long time and Tortorella is seemingly incapable of improving it.

The point about the Rangers not having an elite forward in forever is valid – and it’s pure speculation at this point that Kreider is that either. When was the last time the Rangers even drafted a guy who became a star NHL forward? Savard? Kovalev? Either way you’re going back roughly 2 decades. Maybe this organization just can’t scout and/or develop offensive talent and that’s the end of the story.

Lloyd, I’m not saying he’s ever going to be an elite forward. I don’t know. What I am saying is that he is an elite level offensive prospect. The Rangers haven’t even had that since Pavel Brendl and Jamie Lundmark.

But given Torts’ work with our elite defensive talents, I’m going to give him some leeway on the other side of the puck as well.

I won’t lie, part of what gives me confidence is what he did in Tampa. Lecavalier, St. Louis, and Richards all became stars under his watch.

Are the people that chanted “Henrik, Henrik” after the 3rd goal yesterday the same people that chanted “Marty, Marty” in OT yesterday and the same people that chanted “We Dont Want You” middle of last year and the same people that chanted “We Want Avery” beginning of last year?

NY is to blame, to an extent. They couldn’t just stink enough to draft very high for years….This city, supposedly, wouldn’t allow it. Just ask people who care- most of us would prefer they finish at the bottom from 1997-2004, instead of just finishing in the middle.

Last year I had this annoyign dbag behind me that tried to create his own chants with his dummy friend. Like they had rehearsed them before the game and tried to get them to catch on. And nobody ever chanted with them, not once.

The year before I had a guy who only said how Tortorella sucks and how they should play Avery on the 1st line and the PP. These comments came during the few moments that he managed to pry his lips off of Avery’s man parts.

Not even elite level but there’s generally about 30 30 goal scorers a year. And you figure that some teams have a couple or at least a couple of guys that can score 30 (Crosby/Malkin, Toews/Kane, Sedins/Kesler).

not surprised that Kreider was sent down. my main problem with it is Torts never put him in a position to succeed. started season on a line with Boyle, and we he came back from injury he was on a line with a fellow rookie. I would like to have seen him with Richards and Nash. then if he struggled you can understand him being sent down.

Yea, that’s my point CT (which you can probably back up with statistics and facts and stuff). Did the Kings have one? I mean, Anze Kopitar is good but is he an “elite” scorer? Carter and Richards the same.

And when do we actually get to place some of the blame for players not improving on you know the players themselves.

Who knows if Kreider is being asked to do things on the bench and in practices but not translating that to in games situations. Remember, the big concern about bringing him into the playoffs last year was whether he could play a well rounded enough game to justify getting meaningful ice time. He scored some big goals, but there were also stretches where he could not be trusted because of his play without the puck.

And this year he’s been less than spectacular. Doesn’t mean he’s ruined, just means he’s got some learning today.

In the day of the Original Six, there were 138 players. Now we have almost 700. Any wonder the talent has been watered? Baseball’s worse, ergo all the modern day lousy pitching, all the home runs, all the juice.

We have a good combination right now I think. I’m fine with it. We have outstanding goaltending, tremendous defense (even if it isn’t a massive offensive power), two elite forwards, three above average forwards, some really good prospects and a few grinder/role players.

That’s entirely possible and I’ve found happens more often than not except when a couple of people feel the need to inject themselves into discussions and turn things into a troll fest. But yes, enjoyable, I’ve always enjoyed that dynamic here.

By the way, it’s probably worth trying to define exactly what constitutes an elite goal scorer these days. Looking a bit like the upper end is in the 40-50 range (with a few outliers, naturally).

bull dog, I hear you on putting him in that top 6 role, but with the Hagelin-Stepan-Nash line clicking right now, the only spot for him would be with Richards and Gaborik. With Kreider’s struggles away from the puck, I’m not so sure that’s the best place to put him to give him a chance to succeed, either.

Lev February 15th, 2013 at 4:20 pm
Are the people that chanted “Henrik, Henrik” after the 3rd goal yesterday the same people that chanted “Marty, Marty” in OT yesterday and the same people that chanted “We Dont Want You” middle of last year and the same people that chanted “We Want Avery” beginning of last year

And I admit to being a computer programmer, clumsily performing heart surgery here myself on the (ahem) rare? occasion. It’s fun to play coach, but it’s all a play after all is said and done. Ain’t it?

Most top level nhl players spent little or no time in the minors; and I would rather see kreider in the nhl, but holy cow. For all we know he’s only going down for a few games or until he gets his confidence back. Not a big deal.

Hagelin and Stepan have both flourished since being put on a line with Nash.

Nash could score 40 goals and 50 assits and you would still not be happy with him. Its ok, its your opinion and you are entitled to it. Just remember who leads the team in scoring. And if not for 6-8 goal posts and the inability of some of the forwards and dmen like Mcd in boston and Mdz last night, he would be in the top three in scoring in the league. He has been great so far and will only get better.

Maybe Kreider going back to the Whale is for the best. you don’t want to see him get Gilroy’d. Develop the rising star properly.. we all saw the impact he made in the playoffs. Gotta be consistent.

I went to a handful of Whale games and while Kreider had some good games (showing sparks of brilliance) he seemed a bit disinterested.. floated around a bit. a lot of his shifts were extremely short though.. maybe they didn’t want to risk him getting hurt by some AHL lifer/thug with the NHL season coming up.

I’d really like to see Brian Boyle permanently on the 3rd/4th line and 2nd PK unit. There is really no reason to get cute and insert him on the top two lines.

I am going to trust that Tortorella and management know what they’re doing with Kreider. You know they want this kid contributing with the big club as much as we do. As Tortorella would say, I just see this as part of the process.

Hagelin and Stepan flourished with Gabby last season. the flourishing may have something to do with Hagelin and Stepan.
Czech,
I like Nash, but to say he has made anybody better this season is reaching.

At the end of the day, it boils down to what happens after april 27th. If they make a deep run, we will all be happy and things worked out the way we hoped…if not, then we can start the armchair QB’ing.

This team is still trying to find itself and I am patient. All we need is top 8…preferably higher of course………We can handle any team in the east even Pittsburgh so long as Hank is hot and we have success on special teams.

Toews’ fight tonight reminded me of one of the coolest things connected to NHL players being in the Olympics: when David Backes started fighting all of Team Canada. This time he will fight Russians, Slovakians, and Anze Kopitar.

Powerful! Did you know James Dean (He was in the flic) was dyslexic and couldn’t memorize lines so improvised a lot? Thus his stumbling dialogue, etc. If he weren’t dyslexic, he would probably have been just a pretty boy bore.

Hey, no problemo – this is, after all, a repository for ideas, griping, advice, etc. It’s like the Army without a war, you have to have your little ones in camp. The ad-hominems get me down, but they are few and far between.

ilb said today that (something like) if you need heart surgery, you use a heart surgeon, not a computer programmer, and he got three arguments to the contrary. I laughed all the way to the emergency room.

I have absolutely no freeken idea what freek Tort’s is doing.. I’ve been a true fan of his so far this year until now. Kreider plays well to the level of his competition. He became a very disinterested player at Hartford during the work stopage. I have no freeken idea how this is going to help the kid and not hurt the Rangers. During his play with the team was he really one of the Rangers worst players. Give me a freeken brake I’m freeken pissed. I just think Tort’s with his warped mind has this mental boner for the kid and this is going nowhere. Unfortunately., with this somewhar disfunction coach there always has to be someone to replace ave’s in Tort’s freeken doghouse. Dubie last year, Boyle this and now Kreider. Most of Tort’s remedial measures make little sense and just feed Torts own insecurites. Why change the line up the other nite when we were on a run. Disagree with you Carp but I do have that right why in Gods’s name to put Biron in there vs the Isles when you could have won with Henrik, particularly in the shoot out. Let Biron play Sunday vs the caps who suck. Carp, when would Torts after a game that the Rangers lost ever say well we won 3 out of 4 points. Both games were really freeken dirty. A coach shouldn’t effect a game the Rangers should win. With his jackass temperment he all too often over-coaches to the team detriment. Sorry but really pissed.

Read some of the earlier postsby now and agree that torts hasn’t had that great effect on the improvement of DZ. he’s a freeken offensive player who is being terribly hindered by this coaches totally defensive mindset. He afraid to make a mistake and he’s become an increasing poorer player. Most players that Torts has been given credit for improvement wer very good playersbefore Torts came ie, Callahan, Giradi & Staal. Who are the playersthat Torts has made better somebodygive me list. Stop over coaching. By the way when the Tampa Bay won the Stanley Cup was it Tort’s that may their PP that could or were they just that good. Look at the players tahey had. I’m convinced that Tort’s has no idea how to develop a pp.STOP OVER COACHING

Yikes, I think you guys should meet at the corner bar…must be hard up for social life with all this banter last night. Think only one of the two BC alumni could play at any one time, and Boyle had seniority. Truthfully, I think they expect Boyle to mentor the kid and it was too much along with the focus on improving play for Boyle. If Kreider can play to his potential in Hartford, he’ll be back at some point in time; if not, we’ll wish we had traded him instead of AA.

I think he was absolutely the perfect choice to coach this team after Renney, and I still believe he’s doing the right things to develop this team into a championship caliber contender. Kreider going down was inevitable and probably necessary.

Does no one here remember Callahan being sent down to the AHL for a while? And what happened when he came back up?

Renney’s teams may have made the playoffs, but they were never a legit threat to go far.
Not for nothing but Marek Malik was on the top D pairing for most of those years. Guys like Ville Niemenen rounded out the “depth” coming out of the lock out ’04. Those teams never had a chance with our without Renney. I blame Sather and Dolan…but Renney couldn’t help the situation.

Torts at least has some impact on the personnel decisions and has some kind of vision for the future. Renney may have had been a good guy with the kids, but he never put his stamp on the team, never gave the team a real singular mindset, could never have pushed them to the next level. I think Torts can. Torts wont roll over like Renney probably did IMO, and he can “impose his will” on Sather/Dolan.

all is good in rangerland we did not have to break up the dynamic Halpern, asham, and powe trifecta ..WOW all is good. the line with 1 point for the season…1 total point, but growing with a guy like kreider is to much to ask after all asham is a defensive demon.

He may be a candidate, Wicky…They still have one amnesty buyout left to use after this or after the next season. I feel they will give him two more playoff opportunities before deciding whether to buy him out. But I do not think it’s a forgone conclusion by any stretch….

Hello all. I was supposed to go to the game tomorrow with my brother. The person we get our tickets from got the dates confused and sold our tickets. If anyone knows of anyone selling, please drop me a line on here or on twitter at @NastySays. I was really looking forward to going and this just plain sucks now.

lone, I know I won’t ever convince you of this … Tortorella loves Kreider. Just thinks he is not ready for the NHL. Warned us of that during the playoffs, even. Then heading into this season.

And yes, to those who asked, this was a typical example of fans going nutso over a kid after a short sample. Kreider isn’t seen as a slam-dunk first-line 40-goal winger. Scouts drooled over his speed, size and shot. Tortorella wanted him here sooner than he actually got him so he could begin the development process.

But we saw this with Daniel Goneau, Steven King, now J.T. Miller … a quick couple of goals and everybody thinks superstar.

Kreider, though, is going to be a legit NHL player for a long time (Miller too). That doesn’t mean you force him into an NHL roster spot on a contending team with high expectations if he’s not ready to handle it.

And let’s be honest, Kreider was explosive in the playoffs, but he had a couple of nightmare games, too — and he hasn’t been good at all this year. If you can be honest about that …

I think that miller stayed at this point over kreider (not just because he can play centre) because miller does the “straight ahead” things right now that keep him in the NHL ie hit, play a bit tougher along the boards. seems to just be more physical.

kreider seemed to be a bit soft for his size.

Im not saying he is a bust so don’t even go there, just saying he needs some “bite” to his game at the NHL level.

He may not hate Kreider, but he obviously is showing favouritism to the fourth line whose roles Kreider isn’t really competing for and he doesn’t want his team to score goals because…I don’t know.

More seriously, I definitely share some disappointment that Kreider hasn’t (a) put up big numbers in the AHL during the lockout or (b) immediately shown he’s already a top-six scoring forward, because it would be nice for a Ranger prospect to do that in my lifetime. Just can’t work myself into an angry rage about the coach’s hidden agenda etc.

good grief stuart im just waiting for one of your posts to not be a condescending whine.

Kreider is nowhere near ready. Everyone here was jumping up and down during the playoffs when he scored those couple of goals. He had some very ugly moments in there as well. Moments that seemed to triple to start this year.

Cooke isnt considered a repeat offender now. This is becoming a joke. Im assuming next Karlsson will need to call Cooke and apologize for the public outcry towards Cooke when in fact it was all Karlsson’s fault for putting his achilles under Cooke’s uncontrollable leg?

Thanks, Carp, that was a very kind response considering my angst last night. But do you really think he’s going to improve with the Whale. Did you follow the games during the first 3 months??? He did nothing. Regarding Torts, can you buy into any of the following. Most coaches can teach as well as Torts’s but what makes Tort’s special is that he’s excellent at convincing 23 relatively intelligent players to play a system that makes them human targets for blocking shots of 125mph or more. Usually after 60 or so games you have a few injuries you don’t need and a team that becomes really worn down. Now this worked well because Henik single-handedly stole at least 15 games for us last year. We had no gas left in the tank during the semis with the Devils. I do believe he has not done his job with our very poor numbers on the power play particularly in 5-3 situations. Conrtolling center ice is really the key in winning hockey games and we do lose when were light along the boards.

lone, the only part on which I will disagree … and have since last May … is this idea the Rangers were out of gas against the Devils. They lost that series because they couldn’t score, and because the Devils’ depth did score … and if Richards, Gaborik, Hagelin, McDonagh and Girardi hadn’t been doing snow angels all around a wide-open Henrique in overtime, maybe they get to Game 7, maybe get to the finals, who knows what happens vs. L.A.?

lone, there’s a reason no team has ever advanced to the Stanley Cup Finals after going the distance in the first 2 rounds. When a team plays 20 playoff games (of playoff intensity + overtime periods) in 40 days, there isn’t the necessary time in between games to heal/rest the body and rest the mind. Sure, as Carp said, they couldnt score and the Devils depth did score, but fatigue also played a role in their loss.